The public organisation for promoting the Gaelic language must make "significant improvements", according to a critical report by the Auditor General for Scotland.
Caroline Gardner has raised several concerns about the management of Bord na Gaidhlig, from ineffective leadership to poor relationships and organisational culture.
Created in 2005, its role is to promote the use of Gaelic across Scotland and to advise the Scottish Government about issues relating to the language.
The Inverness-based Bord employs 19 staff and is funded by Scottish Government grants, with a net expenditure in the last year of £5.3 million.
READ MORE: Scottish Gaelic Duolingo app accrues 65,000 users in just one week
In her report looking into the organisation's governance, Ms Gardner said: "Gaelic is an important part of Scotland's culture.
"But all public bodies, irrespective of their size, must demonstrate clear and effective governance and make key decisions in an open and transparent way.
"The Bord's leadership team and board must deliver significant improvements in the issues raised to establish the trust and confidence of staff and stakeholders, including the Parliament and the public."
Warning of a "lack of confidence and a culture of mistrust throughout the organisation" because of the lack of leadership, the report also expressed concern that all board and committee meetings were held in private - indicating a wider problem of "a lack of openness and transparency in decision-making".
READ MORE: Concern after court rules attending Gaelic school ‘not in girl’s best interests’
Responding to the report, the convener of the Scottish Parliament's Public Audit Committee Jenny Marra said: "Time and again we hear of poor leadership and poor governance in public bodies, and Bord na Gaidhlig is no different according to Audit Scotland.
"If Bord na Gaidhlig is to succeed in its mission to safeguard and promote the Gaelic language then substantive improvement will be required.
"The Public Audit committee will want a clear understanding of how they got to this point and how they plan to turn it around."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel